Trump: Destroying USA – British Relations

Donald Trump, like a lot of aged, stupid racists, has taken to social media to share far-right videos.

So far, so unsurprising. Unfortunately – and if you’re just waking from a coma, I’m sorry, this is a hell of a thing to drop on you – Donald Trump is President of the United States and as such the nominal leader of the free world.

To say that we all expected better from the President is only semi-true. We expect better behavior from the office of the president, but not from this particular president himself. Luckily, as the token Brit at Liberal Resistance, I have a pretty good perspective on what the Dotard in Chief shared.

Briefly, Donald Trump – 45th president of the United States and as-yet-un convicted sex offender – re-tweeted three anti-Muslim videos posted by Britain First, a British anti-immigrant group.

Much has been made of Trump showing such overt links to the far right, but let’s be honest: nobody who has been paying even slight attention should be shocked. This is just the first-time Trump has broken his gossamer-thin cover. Still, what most people in America don’t appreciate is just who Britain First are.

In short: They’re nobodies. Literally. Their membership figures are low enough to be on a par with their average supporter’s IQ. Trump sharing their content has been the biggest thing to ever happen to them. They have no overt political power in the UK, despite their attempts to break into politics. They have no seats in Parliament. They have no authority of any kind. Most people couldn’t even tell you the name of the group’s leader – I could, but then I’d just be giving him free publicity, so fuck him, let’s say it’s Archibald Cocksocket.

Britain First exist almost entirely on social media (much like Donald Trump) and are generally the sort of people who post ill-thought-out racist images that get shared by stupid, drunk uncles the world over. The sort of stuff that gets shared by people so lazy in thought that they blame immigrants for their problems, and so lazy in deed that they would never get up and take action on any of the causes they claim to support. They lack, to quote Christopher Hitchens, “the cowardice of their convictions.” (See: Trump, again.)

Britain First are no more dangerous or worthy of attention than the imaginary Muslim hordes that they and Trump live in fear of.

It’s still disgusting that Trump has decided to share their videos – and then, in a moment of typical ineptitude, tweeted to the WRONG Theresa May in response to her piss-weak criticism – but let’s be clear: Views of the kind held by Britain First, and Donald Trump, are still the views of a tiny minority of demonstrably stupid people. Trump has the potential to do enormous damage. Indeed, he already has. But despite his retweets, Britain First isn’t the right-wing juggernaut Trump’s endorsement may imply. They’re basically a handful of arse holes who could probably be crammed into a phone box with a little shoving. They feed on attention. Let’s not give them any.